SyntaxBomb - Indie Coders

Although I wasn't around during the 8 bit Area, I own several C64s, Atari 2600s and even a Vectrex (to name a few) and I love classic gaming. I knew about Robotron, but it's not quite the gameplay I was going for.

You are dashing around the level, avoiding the obstacles, eating the enemies and putting them back in the big paint bucket (that doesn't look like one at all) in the correct order they appeared. The clock is constantly ticking down and everytime you get hit, you lose precious seconds. I do hope for some frantic situations - especially with two players.

Thanks to the suggestions of iWasAdam, the game looks a bit cleaner now (see attached image) and the player doesn't become too distracted from the characters. I still have to set the correct pieces for the corners of the walls, but overall, I am very pleased. For now I have implemented the new wall GFX for the first level, but it's a breeze to get going for the other levels.

I overhauled the collision system today, it feels a bit more satisfying, but still clunky in some situations. However the game is playable and I honestly don't know, if I am able to fix all the wonky collisions until the deadline.

Here is a very short gameplay excerpt (from Level 2-3, that's why the walls don't look correct). No balancing is done on them so far (e.g. how fast traps shoot/enemies spawn etc.). Tomorrow I want to release a playable build and would love to hear your (constructive) feedback. I probably should have started playtesting earlier, but that's the way how jams are

I just found a screenshot from the old version. The game has definitely improved 

Today I sent a testbuild to a friend of mine and was able to identify and fix several bugs (I'm sure there are still a *LOT*).

I've added a couple of menus, most notably an options menu during gameplay. I've adjusted the level editor to be able to place and display the kind of walls iWasAdam suggested.

Unfortunately my friends couldn't get his Xbox controller to work with the game - which runs fine with my controller. If someone could test it out, it would be greatly appreciated (like any other feedback).

Keep in mind that the levels are by no way finalized or done. I just focused on the movement and the menus, but it's already pretty fun to dash around in the levels. From level 3 onwards the new walls are still missing.

Objective:
- Dash (LCtrl) into the colored buckets
- Spit (LShift) them back in the big bucket in the order they appeared

You've got video playback disabled from any site other than youtube so the embedded video isn't going to work for us.

I assume the game is Windows only so can't test it for you as i'm on a Mac here. Sorry.

I did enable embedding now - it should work? Yes, sorry, Windows only since it's made in Blitz3D.

I made a testbuild with the B3D version of Blitzresearch. Does the controller issue still persist?

Despite the recent controller problems, I am continuing work on my game.

This morning I've set up an instruction screen.

I also delayed the flickering effect when the player was hit by something and started showing it, once the invulnerability phase actually starts. The player character goes into an animation that prevents it from moving - which was hard to see, because it instantly started to flicker. Now the player immediately understands what happened and why he can't move around. I'm glad I made that adjustment.

I removed the dash cooldown, which makes for more fun and fluid movement.

Thanks to the help with troubleshooting from Dan, I got the controller to work!

Yesterday I spent mostly tidiying up the graphics. I added a new turret graphic, because the old one was *very* placeholder.

Today I am planning to implement some more levels and I have to fix some bugs. Besides, I have about 3 things on my to do list. Overall I am pleased with my progress and hope I can deliver on time on thursday 

Today, I've released my game jam game on itch.io as a submission for the I Can't Draw, But Want To Make A Game game jam. It was a fun experience and most importantly of all, I've learned that better than good - is good enough. If you have a deadline approaching it helps to make decisions and not trying to always aim for the optimal solution (which simply can't exist for each problem, but we tend to forget that). I am super proud of it, since it's the first project I've completed and released 

If you want to check it out, I'd be delighted. Unfortunately it is Windows only, since it was created with Blitz3D.
https://hosch.itch.io/paint-bucket-pals

Well done - looks great

Thanks for your feedback. It looks great, because of the tipp you gave me considering the walls. Thanks so much for that, it improved the game big time! I might ask for your opinion in future game projects

Hi,

i'v downloaded the game and noticed the fmod.dll in the archive.
With the Legacy blitzbasic you do not need to have it provided, because the dll is already in your compiled exe.
(just a thought.)

I'v played the game a bit, and now, with working joypad, it is alot easier !

Here are my suggestions for improvement:

One thing i'v noticed is that the retry screen uses the second joypad button to continue, instead of #1. I understand that because the game jumps immediately to the retry screen, the second button avoids the accidental misclicks.
It would be nice, if there was a text which tells the user that he should use the second button, to go forward.

The timing on level 3 is a bit tight.

It would be nice, if the levels would teach the player how to play the game, first, before the difficulty gets raised.
Because of the difficulty it is hard to figure out what to do on the level 3. I see there are 4 different colored buckets and they need to be ... put back in the order in which they came out ?

Or maybe add an info screen which tells the player what to do. (clickable on the main menue)

I noticed that there is a time penalty for trying to put a wrong colored bucket back, but no time reward if the correct one is returned.
If the timing is tight, then a timing reward feels better.



Anyway, the game plays very well !

Hi, thanks for your feedback!

I've read somewhere that the .dll is baked into the legacy version, but after the gamepad disaster I didn't want to take any chances and stuck it with the game just in case. Good to know for the future, though.

I am calling FlushJoy() and FlushKeys() before the player reaches that screen, so that was not my intent. I wanted to stick to the Xbox 360 formula, in which Button A is confirm and Button B is discard. At least that's the case with my controller, did yours work differently?

I've received similar feedback concerning level 3 from other players - I totally agree. One reason more to let other people playtest. No excuse or anything, but I found balancing the levels difficult myself, since I knew what to do and probably can finish it blindfolded by now  Which timeframe would you suggest?

It should show an instruction screen once you start level 1, where it states you have to put them back in the correct order. A proper tutorial level would have helped, though, that's true.

That's  a pretty good suggestion as well, it will make the game feel so much more rewarding! I am planning to expand on Paint Bucket Pals in the future and will defnitly implement this feature! Feels more 'arcady' this way.

Thanks for trying out the game!

Today I've added shapes to the colors, to make the game more accessible to the color blind. This will be the last polish for the game jam version, now I want to focus on porting it over to AGK... after I've completed my small scope learning project for it, which I might be able to start next week.